Report on the Derailment which occurred on 14th February 1961 between Holmes Chapel and Sandbach in the London Midland Region British Railways

"On a clear dry afternoon the 3.0 pm. Class C fully fitted parcels train from Manchester (Mayfield) to Crewe, which was hauled by an electric engine and had been made up to its full load of 18 vehicles at Stockport, was passing Holmes Chapel station at a speed well in excess of 60 m.p.h. when one pair of wheels under a covered goods van with a 10 ft. wheelbase became derailed on straight plain track at a point a b u t 60 yards beyond the south end of the station platform. The other pair of wheels under the van became derailed almost immediately afterwards, but the van remained upright and in line and the train ran on for some 3½ miles until the van's derailed wheels struck the lead of the facing crossover approaching Sandbach station and other vehicles in its rear were derailed: one of these, a similar four-wheeled van loaded with 7 tons of sheet lead, struck and carried away the Up side mast of an overhead electrification structure that spanned the main line and its connections with the Northwich branch line opposite Sandbach signal box, and collided with two wagons that were standing on one of two sidings between the Up main line and the signal box.

The shock of these impacts caused the train to break into three parts, and it came to a stand with the engine and the first 13 vehicles, all on the rails, in Sandbach station platform, with a single vehicle standing by itself derailed about 100 yards in rear, and with the remaining 4 vehicles 50 yards in rear again and all derailed and damaged to varying degrees. The last vehicle of the first part was the van that had became derailed on leaving Holmes Chapel, and it had re-railed itself at some point between the signal box and where it came to a stand. The van that had struck the mast would have been the leading vehicle of the third part of the train, but it had been swung round and virtually destroyed in its collision with the mast and with the wagons on the siding, and it was thrown aside by the vehicles in its rear and came to rest jammed between the last vehicle but one in the train, a brake coach, and one of the siding wagons. The mast that was struck supported the overhead wire for all four lines: it was thrown forward some 60 feet, and the structure ahead of it was bent over, the overhead wires for both the main lines and the Northwich branch being brought down. "

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